Theme 2: Shipbuilding and leisure boatbuilding

Whether accidental or deliberate and malicious, an undersea explosion at the very least causes physical disturbance that upsets marine fauna and often results in damage and destruction. For those working on the RESIBAD project, a curtain of air bubbles produced by a ‘bubble pipe’ submerged around the edge of a protected maritime zone potentially offers a means of significantly minimising the effects of such an explosion.

Perfecting the RESIBAD system is of interest to maritime safety and security, coastal management and marine conservation, and most notably for :

• Undersea civil engineering and the protection of installations during maritime construction works and national defence during mine clearance operations,

• Permanent protection of fixed, sensitive sites, such as harbour infrastructure, submarine bases, etc., against unforeseeable malicious damage,

• Protection of mobile structures that require rapid deployment of such a system.

RESIBAD will examine modelling the damping of undersea shock waves as they pass through a diphasic barrier (bubble curtain). The study results will be verified using a small-scale test bench. The project will also study measuring the disturbance caused by the bubble curtain at sea and assess its protective capability, as well as look at developing sensors for measuring underwater pressure and evaluating the frequency of maintenance operations for the ‘bubble pipe’.
Some countries, concerned at protecting undersea fauna, have already adopted regulations to limit noise pollution in water. Similar regulations, though justified, do not yet exist in Europe and would boost development of such a project.

RESIBAD project partners:

Companies :

• Piezotech, Colmar, a company specialising in the production of piezoelectric polymers used in shock pressure sensors

• In Vivo Environnement, La Forêt-Fouesnant, a research consultancy working in the oceanography, environment, industry and engineering fields

• Trafordyn, Saint-Nazaire, a company specialising in the manufacture and use of explosives in the marine environment

• Armor Travaux maritimes, Nantes, a company specialising in maritime, river and undersea construction work

Research centres :

• ENSTA Bretagne, Brest, project director

• Arts et Métiers ParisTech (LALP) Powerful Laser Application Lab

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